About Electronics

Register Hardware: Panasonic has developed what it claims is the world’s first recordable Blu-ray Disc capable of laying down a track at 6x speed – 20 per cent faster than a 16x DVD-R.

Of course, 6x BD-R burners have been available for a while – though Panasonic itself won’t be introducing them until September. LG, on the other hand, released one over here in March.

The discs themselves go on sale in July, initially in Japan. They’ll be available in single-layer, 25GB and dual-layer, 50GB versions.

Panasonic claimed the discs can be burned at any speed from x6 down to x1, allowing them to cope with any “power fluctuations” the writer’s laser may inflict upon them.

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CNet News: Panasonic has confirmed that it still intends to deliver Tru2way TVs to the market before the end of 2008.

A company representative e-mailed CNet with the following statement: Panasonic’s Tru2way-enabled VIERA HDTV is in the certification process at CableLabs. Panasonic expects to deliver Tru2way-enabled VIERA HDTVs to the market in time for the holiday season.

Of course, the company’s expectation does not equal a guarantee that we’ll see the product on store shelves before the end of the year.

But it does represent an affirmation that Panasonic is actively working to address the alleged issues that cropped up during the CableLabs certification process.

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Electricpig: Want a truly future-proof Blu-Ray player? Panasonic’s latest model is exactly what you need. It’s ready equipped with BD-Live features, and one of the few Profile 2 players around.

Aside from the PlayStation 3, it’s one of the few telly companions ready to play back discs with BD-Live features. That means it’s ready to grab new video content from the web, serve up in-movie chat and e-mail as well as letting you play games against other people with the same disc.

The potential for BD-Live is massive. New trailers, sneak peeks at sequels and on-demand comentaries not found on the disc itself are all planned by movie studios, but you’ll need a top notch player to make the most of them.

That’s exactly what Panasonic’s DMP-BD50 represents. Inside are circuits to decode sound in full 7.1 surround, as well as spitting out full HD images at 24p.

It’s also compatitble with the latest HDMI 1.3 connectors, allowing deep colour, and there’s even an SD card on the front so it’ll play back photos or HD video from a camera or camcorder.

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idealo: Samsung has already had a 5.1 home cinema system with a Blu-ray player on the market for awhile in the form of their HT-BD2, now the captain of the television business is following suit by offering a home cinema system and Blu-ray player combination with the SC BT-100. The 3.1 surround system with two front speakers, one centre, and a subwoofer can be expanded to a 5.1 system or even a 7.1 system.

Panasonic has again included everything that HD fans desire and expect: Dolby Digital Plus, True HD, DTS HD, and an iPod connection. The player offers a 1080p upscaling function for normal DVDs. The UniPhier processor is also used in Panasonic’s stand alone DMP-BD30 Blu-ray player, which has already received excellent reviews.

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Reuters: German shoppers seeking bargain Blu-ray video players now the format has won out over HD-DVD should not expect significant price cuts before the Christmas shopping season at the end of the year.“We don’t see big price drops in the next four to five months. Around Christmas, we can expect more dramatic price decreases,” Michael Langbehn, spokesman for the German Blu-ray group and Panasonic Germany said on Tuesday.

Panasonic will start selling its DMP-BD30 Blu-ray player in Germany at the end of this month for 499 euros, half the price of its first Blu-ray player selling in this market.

But Langbehn said it would take two to five years for a mass market to develop, leading to further big price cuts.

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crave: At its 2008 product showcase in Valencia, Panasonic revealed that every year some people manage to hurl their Wii controllers at their expensive flat-panel TVs. Anyone who reads gadget sites will have read these tales of woe and possibly even seen the photos. The good news is that Panasonic has created a Wii-proof TV. Well, it’s Wii-proof as long as you don’t have the lobbing arm of a caber thrower.

You might think it seems daft to go to all that effort, but Panasonic didn’t really have to change very much at all. Generally, plasma TVs do have a much more rigid screen anyway–always with a tough glass front, unlike flimsy LCD panels. So making it resistant to more chucking force can’t have been exactly rocket science.

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Guardian: Japan’s Hitachi Ltd said on Friday it will double its plasma panel output capacity in the year starting in April and step up panel sales to other TV makers in an effort to make its flat TV business profitable.

Hitachi also said it will buy Fujitsu Ltd’s 4.6 percent stake in their plasma panel joint venture to make it a wholly owned unit. Terms of the deal were unavailable.